So why is the Hype! soundtrack on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
Just after college, my pal Nirav and I moved to England to take advantage of a Work in Britain program that extended to students up to six months after they graduated.
We lived about an hour east of London, and as winter set in, it got as cold and wet and dreary as you can imagine.
One night, while browsing my way through an issue of Kerrang! magazine (which Wikipedia describes as a British publication covering “rock, punk and heavy metal music”), I noticed a contest to win tickets to see the UK premiere of a documentary called Hype!, which had something to do with Seattle “grunge” scene.
On a lark and out of boredom, I entered the contest, and then promptly forgot about it. Several weeks later, I received a letter in the mail (this was the Before Times, in which e-mail was not yet in wide use, kids!) congratulating me. Two tickets were included.
Nirav and I were stoked, and we convinced ourselves that the likes of Dave Grohl and Courtney Love and Chris Cornell would surely be in attendance.
On the night of the Big Premiere, we took the long train ride into London, dressed in outfits we hoped were suitable. Well, there were zero celebs in attendance and no other fanfare besides, but we got to watch the Hype! doc along with a group of other pop culture nerds at an independent movie theater.
The documentary is rather interesting, covering both the rise of grunge music out of the Pacific Northwest (a region of the U.S. that was completely exotic and mysterious to me at the time) and how the music industry spread and exploited grunge as a “brand” for all it was worth. Think Sears’ fall “grunge wear” line of clothes and apparel, for example.
Musically, both the documentary and its soundtrack (which I got my hands on soon after having seen the doc) melted my brain and opened a world of music to me that I still adore to this day.
I was already a huge fan of Nirvana and familiar enough with some of the most popular bands to come out of the grunge scene, but there are a staggering number of bands – many of them unknown to this day outside of hardcore music fans – on this one single soundtrack that became important to me over time.
Chief among them is the legendary Seattle band the Fastbacks, which already has five albums covered on this here best 1,000 albums ever project, with one more to go! Their brand of ebullient pop punk, masterful guitar hooks, and delightful vocals pleases me endlessly.
The Hype! soundtrack includes live versions of “K Street” and “Just Say.” I’ve always preferred the live version of both songs slightly more than their studio versions, and the fact that the soundtrack includes two Fastbacks tracks shows off how integral the band is to the region’s musical history.
And here’s two more songs from great female-fronted grunge bands which the Hype! doc exposed me to: 7 Year Bitch’s “Knot,” and “Second Skin” by The Gits.
The Melvins and the Wipers were both locally successful bands that Kurt Cobain played a direct role in helping to bring to a wider audience. I’ve become a huge fan of the Wipers in recent years. Hype! includes the caustic “Night Goat” by the Melvins, and “Return of the Rat” from the Wipers, off of their fantastic Is This Real? LP (#293 of the best 1,000 albums ever).
Tracks like “54/40 or Fight” by Dead Moon remind me that this is music produced in a remote corner of the country which, pre-Internet, was culturally cut off from the rest of the country in some ways. It’s also music that wasn’t made in an attempt to “crossover” to a mainstream audience – it’s raw, passionate, exciting, and at times angry music made to please the artists who produced it for a small, enthusiastic group of fans.
Or, more succinctly: it kicks ass.
“Touch Me, I’m Sick,” by Mudhoney, is a decent litmus test that will tell you if you’re into this brand of music or not for the most part. I absolutely dig it, not surprisingly, and I’m thrilled that I caught Mudhoney live in San Francisco at a tiny venue only a few short years after this documentary was released.
The Nirvana cut selected for the album is the blistering “Negative Creep,” off of Bleach.
The liner notes for the Hype! soundtrack includes little notes about each song, and I recall that for Nirvana, it states that they’re the best band in the world post-1988 or so (with the inclusion of “RIP Kurt.”) And if I remember correctly, Mudhoney is credited as the best band in the world pre-1988.
“My Hometown,” by Girl Trouble is a really fun, raucous number that sets the scene for the entire vibe of the documentary and the soundtrack.
Some stats & info about the Hype! soundtrack
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Grunge, Punk Rock, Seattle Bands, Rock Music, Hard Rock, Alternative Rock, Indie Rock, Movie Soundtracks, Compilations
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – not ranked!
- All Music’s rating – 4 out 5 stars
- When was the Hype! soundtrack released? 1996
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #118 out of 1,000
The Hype! soundtrack on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from the Hype! soundtrack that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
Well, you better watch out. Well, you better beware, ‘cause they’re coming from all sides of the country now.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective review of what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.